Incorporating Environmental and Social Safeguards into Climate Change Adaptation Strategies in Households

The effect of climate change on households cannot be overemphasized. A wide range of actions – structural, institutional or social – are employed in adapting to the vagaries of climate change. These actions, though anthropogenic, create new threats for both local and regional ecosystems. At the household level, the actions/strategies fall under category B, which indicates minor and non-cumulative potential impacts on the environment and the socio-economic life of the people. To mitigate the risks of these actions requires the incorporation of environmental and social safeguards into climate change adaptation measures. This paper therefore recommends for enforcement, implementation and monitoring of this safeguards system in all climate change adaptation measures/ interventions, as this is the only sure way of achieving sustainable socio-economic development, poverty elimination and environmental sustainability in the households in particular, and communities in general.